Arcangelo Sassolino‘s “La condizione del desiderio” (The Condition of Desire) is on display at Villa e Collezione Panza in Varese. This monumental installation is the result of a close dialogue between art and science, and inaugurates a new cycle of exhibitions with site-specific works.

“I think of sculpture not as a static present, but rather as a flow of time, of its incessant being,
ineluctable and unpredictable change, just like life itself”. Arcangelo Sassolino.

Curated by Angela Vettese, on show at the Villa e Panza Collection in Varese until 23 February 2025 – in the evocative setting of the Scuderia Grande – is Arcangelo Sassolino‘s “La condizione del desiderio (The Condition of Desire)”*, a monumental installation that stems from a close dialogue between art and science, crucial themes in the artist’s research and at the centre of Giuseppe Panza di Biumo’s investigations as seen in the exhibition Nel Tempo (In Time). Works from Colleizione Panza*, still on show at Villa Panza, which presents works by authors from Fogliati to Mochetti to Walter de Maria that take the form of an investigation into the interaction between invisible forces and the physical world.

THE CONDITION OF DESIRE

The work, entitled The Condition of Desire (2009-2024), is an imposing structure conceived by the artist in 2009 for the space Z33, in Hasselt, Belgium, which at Villa Panza finds a new configuration and an ideal location in the Scuderia Grande of the Villa, which Giuseppe Panza di Biumo imagined as a place to set up powerful works of art:

“When I entered this space,” says the artist, “I was reminded of Hasselt’s work and realised that here were the ideal conditions to show it: because of its size, the acoustics, the light and the fact that Villa Panza is a temple of minimal meditation.

The installation consists of a girders structure, driven by an air system that allows the slow and constant oscillation of a long mechanical arm, which occupies the entire space of the Scuderia. Hanging from the ends of the arm are two heavy slabs of white marble from Carnia, a material that, for the artist, is not only a tribute to tradition, but also a symbol linked to the condition of man. Sassolino explains:

“We associate it with classical sculptures, we find it in churches. I was interested in the idea that it became somehow light in its floating in the air’.

The weight of the material, however, is not cancelled: the load weighs on the beams and forces the central pivot of the structure to the limit, where all the fatigue of the machine seems to be concentrated, as in an archimedical point.

In this perpetual, unresolved attempt to find balance, the work not only marks the relentless passage of time, but becomes a metaphor for desire.

For Sassolino, desire is always connected to an activity, an impulse, an effort that does not always achieve its result. He describes it as the emblem of the paradox of existence, the expression of a lack, a need, and an attempt to suppress them. However, to suppress lack and need would be to eliminate life itself, suppressing the making of existence.

“A desire,” Angela Vettese emphasises, “that can never be said to be satisfied and that, in its pendular motion, continually imposes an expenditure of energy and a state of alarm that are also constant data of Sassolino’s poetics.

PROJECT-ROOM WITH SITE-SPECIFIC WORKS

This project is in keeping with the tradition of Villa and Collezione Panza, which over the years has welcomed works related to the confrontation between art, nature and science: “Project rooms with site-specific works,” says Gabriella Belli, curator of exhibition activities and of Villa Panza’s scientific programme, “that will invite the public to measure themselves against the experiences and languages of talented artists, young and not so young, dialoguing with the works of the permanent collection and capable of arousing the curiosity of visitors through works that will confront what was the cultural line of Giuseppe Panza di Biumo, showing unprecedented creative experiences”.

The installation is accompanied by a catalogue, published by Mainz, with an unpublished interview with the artist by Angela Vettese, a text by Gabriella Belli and one by Marta Spanevello, and a video interview with the artist accessible on the digital platform via QR code at the beginning of the visit.

The project room is an enrichment and addition to the exhibition Nel Tempo. Works from Collezione Panza*, which opened on 6 June 2024 and will run until 6 January 2025.

ARCANGELO SASSOLINO

Arcangelo Sassolino (Vicenza, 1967) always moves in a dialogue with physics in his artistic practice. Speed, pressure, gravity, acceleration and heat constitute the essential forces of a research aimed at highlighting, by probing the extreme limits of resistance of matter, those conditions of crisis that are at the origin of different forms of becoming. His installations are always the expression of an ongoing conflict, in which materials are subjected to real fatigue. Tightness or possible failure are in this sense constitutive of his work, often becoming metaphors for the human condition.

His first major solo exhibition took place in 2008 at the Palais de Tokyo in Paris, where, with the installation Afasia 1, he explored the interaction between waiting and speed, generating tangible tension through the energy released by his work. His sculptures are suspended between potential and action, an evocation of wavering control, prompting the viewer to continually reflect on transformation, change and the possibility of failure.

In 2022, he represented Malta at the 59th International Art Exhibition of the Venice Biennale with the installation Diplomazija astuta, where it dialogued with one of the most powerful scenes in art history: Caravaggio’s The Beheading of St John the Baptist. The work showed how the conflict and unresolved tension of the forces in the field can appear, if only for an instant and in the form of a new, unexpected and burning light, as the very origin of things. Sassolino’s works have been exhibited in prestigious international contexts, including: Frankfurter Kunstverein, Frankfurt; Fondation Carmignac, Île de Porquerolles; Spazi Capaci, Palermo; Kunstmuseum Bonn; the 17th. International Architecture Exhibition, La Biennale di Venezia; CAM, St. Louis; Grand Palais, Paris; MACRO Museum, Rome; CCC Strozzina, Florence; MART Museum, Rovereto; Swiss Institute, New York; Tinguely Museum, Basel; Peggy Guggenheim Collection, Venice.

*articles in Italian